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How Old Is The Orthodox Faith
E-Mail | Unknown | Rev. Dr. Miltiades Efthimiou

Posted on 06/18/2007 12:22:11 PM PDT by TexConfederate1861

If you are a Lutheran, your religion was founded by Martin Luther, an ex-monk of the Catholic Church, in the year 1517.

If you belong to the Church of England, your religion was founded by King Henry VIII in the year 1534 because the Pope would not grant him a divorce with the right to re-marry.

If you are a Presbyterian, your religion was founded by John Knox in Scotland in the year 1560.

If you are a Congregationalist, your religion was originated by Robert Brown in Holland in 1582.

If you are Protestant Episcopalian, your religion was an offshoot of the Church of England, founded by Samuel Senbury in the American colonies in the 17th century.

If you are a Baptist, you owe the tenets of your religion to John Smyth, who launched it in Amsterdam in 1606.

If you are of the Dutch Reformed Church, you recognize Mic helis Jones as founder because he originated your religion in New York in 1628.

If you are a Methodist, your religion was founded by John and Charles Wesley in England in 1774.

If you are a Mormon (Latter Day Saints), Joseph Smith started your religion in Palmyra, New York, in 1829.

If you worship with the Salvation Army, your sect began with William Booth in London in 1865.

If you are Christian Scientist, you look to 1879 as the year in which your religion was born and to Mary Baker Eddy as its founder.

If you belong to one of the religious organizations known as "Church of the Nazarene, Pentecostal Gospel," "Holiness Church," or "Jehovah's Witnesses," your religion is one of the hundreds of new sects founded by men within the past hundred years.

If you are Roman Catholic, your church shared the same rich apostolic and doctrinal heritage as the Orthodox Church for the first thousand years of its history, since during the first millennium they were one and the same Church. Lamentably, in 1054, the Pope of Rome broke away from the other four Apostolic Patriarchates (which include Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem), by tampering with the Original Creed of the Church, and considering himself to be infallible. Thus your church is 1,000 years old.

If you are Orthodox Christian, your religion was founded in the year 33 by Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It has not changed since that time. Our church is now almost 2,000 years old. And it is for this reason, that Orthodoxy, the Church of the Apostles and the Fathers is considered the true "one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church."

This is the greatest legacy that we can pass on to the young people of the new millennium.


TOPICS: Catholic; Mainline Protestant; Orthodox Christian
KEYWORDS: orthodox; protestant; romancatholic
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To: kawaii

At the speed which Rome innovates, adding more points to reconcile, you sure 3054 will be any better than now, right now? May as well be done with it & submit yourself to Her as She stands & try to work things out from the inside.


201 posted on 06/20/2007 5:14:40 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: GoLightly; TexConfederate1861
Dialog yes, full communion, no. I’m not holding my breath. Are you?

It's not a matter of breath, or chance. The Church is actively working on re-union. There are two hurdles in that process,. The first one is the issue of papacy, the nature and the extent of its jurisdiction. The second one involves theological constructs over which we seem to be in disagreement, namely the dogmatic pronouncements of the Latin Church pronounced after the de facto dissolution of communion.

Papacy must be dealt with first. Once the Church has agreed on the issue of jurisdictional primacy, the Pope can call for the next Ecumenical Council. It is the EC that will then take up the burden of theology.

However, the dialogue is preparing the ground for these issues to be well-prepared when such a Synod is convened. The dialogue has debunked many myths and has shown that many of our theological differences are peculiar to our different traditions and not different theological truths.

It is entirely possible that, in one tradition, it is impossible to frame theology in the same way as in another tradition, even if both speak the same truth, just as it is impossible to frame a sentence in exactly the same way in a different language; a "true" translation is not one that is word-by-word (because words and tenses may not even exist in the other language) but whether the intent or the spirit.

Thus, it is important that Catholics and Orthodox say that God the Father is the source of everything and all, and that, as regards the Holy Spirit, there is no double procession. It is important to believe in the Real Presence as an unspeakable mystery and not in the exact mechanism made up by human reason.

So, a reunion will not be "fusing" or "morphing" of either side into he other, but in establishing that both particular sides of the Church believe in the same thing, but express it differently in their respective traditions.

Catholic priests are allowed to permit Anglicans to partake of the Eucharist if the priest has established that the Anglicans in question have a Catholic understanding and belief as regard the sacrament (i.e. that the Lord is physically present and not just symbolically). Thus, the intent of their reception is considered "Catholic" and therefore licit.

202 posted on 06/20/2007 5:26:09 AM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: kawaii

Is there one set of keys or are there a bunch of them? Did Christ hand out keys all around?


203 posted on 06/20/2007 5:27:57 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: GoLightly
Appoint for yourselves? Who said that? No way to know & the The Didache didn’t make it into the canon. Is it any wonder why?

What are you talking about? Where are you quoting from? What is your point?

204 posted on 06/20/2007 5:28:17 AM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: kosta50

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/didache-hoole.html


205 posted on 06/20/2007 5:31:26 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: GoLightly; kawaii
Is there one set of keys or are there a bunch of them? Did Christ hand out keys all around?

He gave the power to bind and loosen ("the keys") to the original set of Apostles (minus Judas). "The keys" are not physical keys but the authority from God. The Apostles, in turn, passed that on to their successors, by the same authority.

206 posted on 06/20/2007 5:32:12 AM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: GoLightly

The Didache is NOT normative! It has zero authority.


207 posted on 06/20/2007 5:33:02 AM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: GoLightly

a few more popes like benedict though and a lot of these innovations may be swept under the rug.

either way there has always been some disparity between the east and west in practice, heck there still is in the eastern rite churches in rome.

as far as submission though i dont see submission ever happening. rome can come back to the table as the first amoung EQUALS sure, but will have to give up the idea that it can unilaterly act on the jurisdictions of other patriarchates.


208 posted on 06/20/2007 5:33:47 AM PDT by kawaii (Orthodox Christianity -- Proclaiming the Truth Since 33 A.D.)
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To: GoLightly

kosta answers this nicely...


209 posted on 06/20/2007 5:34:36 AM PDT by kawaii (Orthodox Christianity -- Proclaiming the Truth Since 33 A.D.)
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To: kosta50
The first one is the issue of papacy, the nature and the extent of its jurisdiction.

Not a small sticking point, specially considering the innovative elevations that Latins have given to the office since the split.

210 posted on 06/20/2007 5:37:19 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: kosta50

I’m well aware of that & I have an idea why.


211 posted on 06/20/2007 5:38:42 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: GoLightly

A good start:

While still a brilliant theologian at the university, he endeared himself to the separated Eastern Orthodox with his famed “Ratzinger Formula.” In Graz (1976), the Roman Church dogmatician shocked the ecumenical world by declaring that “what was possible during a whole millennium can Christianly not be impossible today.” Consequently, “on the doctrine of the primacy (of the papacy), Rome must not require more from the East than what was formulated and lived out during the first millennium”–that is, prior to the 1054 Great Schism.

Ratzinger later clarified that his 1976 statement was not meant as a mere chronological return, but as a mutual commitment to confess the essential doctrinal consensus that had emerged as the ecclesial heritage of the first seven ecumenical councils of the undivided early church (through II Nicaea, 787).

http://www.carthage.edu/augustine/index.php?page_id=10/


212 posted on 06/20/2007 5:39:29 AM PDT by kawaii (Orthodox Christianity -- Proclaiming the Truth Since 33 A.D.)
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To: kosta50
He gave the power to bind and loosen ("the keys") to the original set of Apostles (minus Judas). "The keys" are not physical keys but the authority from God. The Apostles, in turn, passed that on to their successors, by the same authority.

He gave them to Peter, along with the charge to feed His sheep. Your position on it, that they were given to all of the Apostles & their successors is an interesting innovation.

213 posted on 06/20/2007 5:43:50 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: kawaii
a few more popes like benedict though and a lot of these innovations may be swept under the rug.

Don't count on Rome giving up Her position on infallibility, cuz it's not the kind of thing that can be swept under the rug. At best, you can hope for Rome to take the position that future popes will no longer exercise it, though it could not be made binding on any future popes.

214 posted on 06/20/2007 5:50:55 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: GoLightly

i don’t care what they do with it within their jurisdiction. Rome’s been doing wacky things the rest of the church doesn’t for quite a while (unmarried only priests for instance)


215 posted on 06/20/2007 5:52:49 AM PDT by kawaii (Orthodox Christianity -- Proclaiming the Truth Since 33 A.D.)
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Comment #216 Removed by Moderator

To: kawaii

Orthodox have the better position on that issue, IMO, where Rome has rightful authority over Her share of the flock, while the other Patriarchies have the same over their share of the flock. You & I both know that is NOT Rome’s position.


217 posted on 06/20/2007 6:03:05 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: FormerLib; Religion Moderator
Considering the source, I reasoned it was a lame attempt to connect all Christians to the Inquisition. Of course, you and I know how silly that is.

Its a line from a friggin movie for cryin' out loud. lol. Hey Mr. Religion Moderator would it be making it personal to verbalize an observation that this guy is really wound up tight? :-)

218 posted on 06/20/2007 6:06:43 AM PDT by Invincibly Ignorant
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To: kawaii
Ratzinger’s position isn’t inconsistent with maintaining full authority in Rome, the good shepherd not wanting to put too heavy of a yoke on all of those under Her.
219 posted on 06/20/2007 6:09:24 AM PDT by GoLightly
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To: TexConfederate1861
Your link still doesn’t prove plagarism.

The links show the exact same article with all the same writing other than changing around the Orthodox/Catholic line.

The Catholic version has been bouncing around the web for at least a decade and can be found on numerous websites via Google.

Its obviously plagarism.

220 posted on 06/20/2007 6:14:33 AM PDT by Andrew Byler
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